Less than two weeks away from the spring election, the city of Milwaukee is sounding the alarm over the possibility that thousands of people there may have had their voter registrations erroneously inactivated because in efforts to have clean voter registration data, Wisconsin joined a multistate program called the Electronic Registration Information Center in 2016. ERIC, as it’s known, purges voters from the rolls for having inconsistent voter registration addresses. But city election officials say the ERIC system is flawed because of inaccurate address information provided by the state DMV and the U.S. Post Office. This year Milwaukee was informed by the state that nearly 47,000 records were flagged for those address inconsistencies. After some voters verified their addresses or re-registered, about 32,000 records were inactivated. That leaves Milwaukee with the lowest number of registered voters in 50 years. And officials there worry about disenfranchising potentially thousands of voters in the upcoming spring and fall elections. Mayor Tom Barrett joins us from Milwaukee. Mayor, thanks very much for doing so.
Tom Barrett:
Thank you very much.
Frederica Freyberg:
Of the 32,000 records deactivated, do you know how many were done so in error?
Tom Barrett:
We don’t and that’s the problem. We don’t know. And I don’t know that the state officials know. And let me start this out by saying we are not claiming there’s something nefarious going on here. We though believe this is not ready for prime time. That in order for this system to be put in place, you want to make sure that you are not taking people’s names off the voting rolls if they’re eligible to vote. The Constitutional right to vote should be paramount here. And if that means we’re going to have a few extra names on the voting rolls and the people don’t show up, that doesn’t offend me as much as having someone who is legally able to vote being denied the right to vote because they can’t, for whatever reason, register on election day.
Frederica Freyberg:
Now, the state says that if 100 Milwaukee voters had to re-register with their same addresses in February as they did, April's election will probably see 200 who have to do that. But that every voter deactivated the state says, will be on a supplemental poll list and can affirm their address and vote. Doesn’t that fix the immediate problem?
Tom Barrett:
I think it’s a short-term fix, but we have two very important fall elections as well. And we have had no assurances that we’re going to be able to use that same system in the fall. I think it’s a little bit more cumbersome obviously to have to go to a second list because if you’re not on the first list, you don’t know necessarily that you’re on the second list. It’s going to take some additional training, obviously, to make sure that our poll workers know if someone doesn’t show up, then you have to look at the second list. But once you get to the November election, for example, if you’re using that system then, and we don’t even have any assurances we can use that system then — that could result in longer delays and some people not being given the right to vote.
Frederica Freyberg:
How did these errors with the ERIC system occur, in your understanding?
Tom Barrett:
My understanding is that the state relied on a Department of Motor Vehicles and that the computers didn’t talk well to each other. I hear a lot of different things. And people who are much more attune to this than I I think probably could give you the nuances. But let me give you an example. What happens if on your Department of Motor Vehicle’s address it says apartment 3, and it doesn’t say apartment 3 when you vote. And you get dropped because of that. That’s one issue. A second issue might be that you live in Madison or you live in Baraboo but your car is registered in Jefferson County because you have a separate residence there. That would be an example of someone who’s getting bumped. I think students who may have their address on their driver’s license as one location in the state of Wisconsin and then a second location for voting, they may run into difficulties. And of course when you’ve got low-income people, they’re going to be moving much more often. And if they don’t coordinate those moves, it’s going to make it more difficult for them to re-register on election day.
Frederica Freyberg:
And here’s one more thing the state told us. They said, “We have learned that some people who fill out a USPS change of address form do so because USPS has been having trouble delivering mail to their address, not because they moved. Because of that, we reactivated approximately 7,000 voters statewide after the February 20 spring primary.” So just one more kind of explanation for how some of these errors might have occurred. But ERIC is in place in 23 other states. Are you familiar with other states having these kinds of issues?
Tom Barrett:
I think in some states it’s worked well. I think in some states there have been issues. Our election commissioner–election director essentially said that this is a situation where we want to make sure that it’s done right before we go live with it. There’s no rush to go live with it until it’s done right. And, again, it gets back to the fundamental right to vote. I don’t want to be in a situation where people are being disenfranchised because of inaccurate data supplied by the Department of Motor Vehicles, inaccurate data supplied by the U.S. Post Office. I want people to be able to vote.
Frederica Freyberg:
You’ve written to the governor about this matter. What’s been the response?
Tom Barrett:
We haven’t heard back. We sent a letter out earlier this week so again, I’m not raising a flag that there’s something nefarious going on here. It’s a problem. I want to solve the problem. It’s that simple. I don’t think that this should be a political battle because it’s the fundamental right to vote. I think everybody should agree if someone is eligible to vote, they should be able to vote. I’m well aware that we’re in a political environment where there are times when people want to make it more difficult for people to vote, but I certainly don’t think this is a situation where we should be making it more difficult to vote for anybody, but certainly not for someone who has the correct information but the state might have the wrong information.
Frederica Freyberg:
What does this do, in your mind, to voter confidence?
Tom Barrett:
Well, I think anytime you go to the polls and you’re standing there and you show them your photo ID and they say, “Well, you’re not on the list.” You’re taken aback. What do you mean? I’m on the list. And then to be told that you’re not, I think obviously has an impact on your confidence in the system when something like that happens. Again, as you pointed out, for the April election, if you know enough to go to the second list, you might be on the second list. That assumes two things. That assumes either, one, the poll worker knows to go to that second list and we’re going to try to make sure that happens. I can’t guarantee that 100% of the time. Or that you know that there’s a second list that you should be checking.
Frederica Freyberg:
All right. Mayor Tom Barrett, thanks very much for spending the time to talk with us about this.
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